She smiled, mounted Xander, then looked down at him. “I hope you found someone to take care of your little trees. I have too much to do to tend to them.”

She didn’t wait for his answer, but turned Xander around, then pulled on the reins so he went two steps back. As she knew he would, Pauly leaped to the side. He didn’t like big animals. She gave him one last smile, then urged the horse forward, knowing that Xander’s iron-clad hooves were digging into the carefully tended soil. She didn’t lead the big horse down a row of trees and flatten them, but she wanted to!

CHAPTER THREE

Adam felt like he was drowning in paperwork. His father believed that paperwork would get itself done, so he rarely bothered with it. As the mayor of Mason and the “fixer of problems,” Burke had been forgiven for his foibles. When he was late with a payment to a local merchant, a pretty girl would be sent to get a payment from him. Burke and the young woman would spend the day laughing, eating and drinking, and eventually someone would drive her home with a check in her hand.

But Adam wasn’t his father. He believed bills should be paid and things kept in order.

When he heard a car engine, he glanced out the big window. Robbie had finally come home. It was 7:00 a.m., his clothes were rumpled and a cigarette was hanging out of his mouth. He looked like he’d been up all night, with up being the key word.

Wonder who it was? Adam thought. He hoped it wasn’t some local girl who would be planning to move in with the Hattens.

Robbie came into the house and went to the kitchen without so much as a glance at his older brother. “Who’d you get to cook?” he asked.

Adam didn’t answer.

Robbie rounded the corner, a plate piled high with chicken and tortillas. “This is from Forey. Did you know that she’s got a nephew staying with them? I hear he’s old. Like you.”

Adam glared at his brother.

There wasn’t as much difference in their looks as between Vera and Kelly, but Robbie was the pretty one, with a face of such sweetness that he made people smile. Adam was handsome, but he tended to scowl. No one bothered Adam when he didn’t want them to.

The brothers were the same height but Adam was wider, built more strongly. In high school, he was a coach’s dream, good at all sports, played well with his teammates. A quintessential man’s man. For years, it was thought that Adam might go pro in several sports. But when he was a senior, he hurt his knee badly enough that the sports life was out of the picture.